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Am I wrong in thinking that "not completed" is often vastly closer to "having a degree" than "never started"? Obviously some people fail out of degrees complete

Am I wrong in thinking that "not completed" is often vastly closer to "having a degree" than "never started"? Obviously some people fail out of degrees completely, but many start a degree because they're capable and simply find out they dislike the content.

tjpnz 3y ago
That would be a situation for which I'd request a transcript - probably the only situation, because the second you're handed that degree I no longer care what your grades were. Where I'm from, if you're bombing out of classes you'll be excluded from university. Takes about two years if you're terrible and incapable of getting the message. But it's something I would like to know because it is a signal.
ako 3y ago
Not completing something simply because you dislike it is a big red flag. At work you often have to finish stuff you don’t like, you don’t want employee that will start something but rely on others to finish it.
- hardware2win 3y ago
  What if it aint "dont like", but "not worth"? Like, if there is no value in wasting time on completion
  - al_borland 3y ago
    Maybe the earlier working years and experience, as well as money saved, was worth more than the opportunities the degree could open up. If not, and being passed over for jobs later in life is becoming a problem, maybe that original assessment was incorrect. This is generally only something a person can have certainty about in hindsight.
  - ako 3y ago
    There’s always value in completing, but if you instead do something more valueable, and can explain it, it might be the opposite of a red flag. But the comment explicitly stated “dislike the content”.
- duxup 3y ago
  > is a big red flag That seems overly simplistic. Everyone doesn’t complete somethings because they don’t like it. Decisions and life is far more muddy and complicated than that.
- 7speter 3y ago
  And if you get a degree from college, it means you made something out of a lot of classes that at first glance, seemed useless. Also research skills, and the ability to pick something up on your own, maybe with a little help and practice. But what do I know I’m a college grad who barely gets any interviews for anything.
michaelt 3y ago
There are many reasons you might not complete a degree, and some don't reflect badly on the student at all. The problem is, everyone who drops out due to inability presents themselves as having dropped out to work on their startup or suchlike. So it's something of a market for lemons.
- brailsafe 3y ago
  Which is a shame, because in this case University itself often doesn't need to justify itself as more than an arbitrary time sink that rewards people who can both do the work intellectually, and afford both the fee and time to sink into it.
nickff 3y ago
Not completed shows that you were accepted to an institution, so it matters how selective the institution was. There’s a lot of research that shows there’s some (wage) benefit to the first year of college, then not so much for the second or third, but a lot more for the degree. Bryan Caplan’s book on the subject covers this ‘sheepskin effect’ very well.
- ghaff 3y ago
  You get the filtering effect for MIT/Stanford/etc. Then it's a mix between "decided the academic thing wasn't right for me" and "it got tough so decided to bail" whether or not that's ever explicitly stated. (Or random family etc. issues etc.)
sokoloff 3y ago
Starting college and not completing it is a mixed signal as compared to never starting. If you allowed me 1000s of trials and I could wager on each of them, I'd wager that the SAT scores of those who started were higher than the SAT scores of those who never started. In that regard, being accepted to and starting college is a positive signal. At the same time, someone who started and dropped out might be seen as a signal that they could not conform to and complete a structured program. Or maybe they couldn't hack the collegiate level work after coasting through primary and secondary education. In that regard, someone who never attended college but taught themself programming (at least enough to pass the tech screen on 'all else equal' footing with degreed candidates) might be a better bet than someone who dropped out after two years in a comp sci program and screened the same.
- neilv 3y ago
  > If you allowed me 1000s of trials and I could wager on each of them, I'd wager that the SAT scores of those who started were higher than the SAT scores of those who never started. In that regard, being accepted to and starting college is a positive signal. If theory behind your wagers was correct, and if you're optimizing for SAT scores.
  - sokoloff 3y ago
    Underlying this proposition is that I'm optimizing for* something closer to what IQ (and SAT) measures. * "optimizing for" meaning "I'd prefer a higher score over a lower one, all else equal".
    - LtWorf 3y ago
      But IQ is completely useless as a measure. I've met people with really high IQ that were unable to do 1st year university math, and after a number of years dropped out of engineering. And yet their IQ tests were amazing…
      - al_borland 3y ago

tjpnz 3y ago

That would be a situation for which I'd request a transcript - probably the only situation, because the second you're handed that degree I no longer care what your grades were. Where I'm from, if you're bombing out of classes you'll be excluded from university. Takes about two years if you're terrible and incapable of getting the message. But it's something I would like to know because it is a signal.

ako 3y ago

Not completing something simply because you dislike it is a big red flag. At work you often have to finish stuff you don’t like, you don’t want employee that will start something but rely on others to finish it.

hardware2win 3y ago
What if it aint "dont like", but "not worth"? Like, if there is no value in wasting time on completion
- al_borland 3y ago
  Maybe the earlier working years and experience, as well as money saved, was worth more than the opportunities the degree could open up. If not, and being passed over for jobs later in life is becoming a problem, maybe that original assessment was incorrect. This is generally only something a person can have certainty about in hindsight.
- ako 3y ago
  There’s always value in completing, but if you instead do something more valueable, and can explain it, it might be the opposite of a red flag. But the comment explicitly stated “dislike the content”.
duxup 3y ago
> is a big red flag That seems overly simplistic. Everyone doesn’t complete somethings because they don’t like it. Decisions and life is far more muddy and complicated than that.
7speter 3y ago
And if you get a degree from college, it means you made something out of a lot of classes that at first glance, seemed useless. Also research skills, and the ability to pick something up on your own, maybe with a little help and practice. But what do I know I’m a college grad who barely gets any interviews for anything.

michaelt 3y ago

There are many reasons you might not complete a degree, and some don't reflect badly on the student at all. The problem is, everyone who drops out due to inability presents themselves as having dropped out to work on their startup or suchlike. So it's something of a market for lemons.

brailsafe 3y ago
Which is a shame, because in this case University itself often doesn't need to justify itself as more than an arbitrary time sink that rewards people who can both do the work intellectually, and afford both the fee and time to sink into it.

nickff 3y ago

Not completed shows that you were accepted to an institution, so it matters how selective the institution was. There’s a lot of research that shows there’s some (wage) benefit to the first year of college, then not so much for the second or third, but a lot more for the degree. Bryan Caplan’s book on the subject covers this ‘sheepskin effect’ very well.

ghaff 3y ago
You get the filtering effect for MIT/Stanford/etc. Then it's a mix between "decided the academic thing wasn't right for me" and "it got tough so decided to bail" whether or not that's ever explicitly stated. (Or random family etc. issues etc.)

sokoloff 3y ago

Starting college and not completing it is a mixed signal as compared to never starting. If you allowed me 1000s of trials and I could wager on each of them, I'd wager that the SAT scores of those who started were higher than the SAT scores of those who never started. In that regard, being accepted to and starting college is a positive signal. At the same time, someone who started and dropped out might be seen as a signal that they could not conform to and complete a structured program. Or maybe they couldn't hack the collegiate level work after coasting through primary and secondary education. In that regard, someone who never attended college but taught themself programming (at least enough to pass the tech screen on 'all else equal' footing with degreed candidates) might be a better bet than someone who dropped out after two years in a comp sci program and screened the same.

neilv 3y ago
> If you allowed me 1000s of trials and I could wager on each of them, I'd wager that the SAT scores of those who started were higher than the SAT scores of those who never started. In that regard, being accepted to and starting college is a positive signal. If theory behind your wagers was correct, and if you're optimizing for SAT scores.
- sokoloff 3y ago
  Underlying this proposition is that I'm optimizing for* something closer to what IQ (and SAT) measures. * "optimizing for" meaning "I'd prefer a higher score over a lower one, all else equal".
  - LtWorf 3y ago
    But IQ is completely useless as a measure. I've met people with really high IQ that were unable to do 1st year university math, and after a number of years dropped out of engineering. And yet their IQ tests were amazing…
    - al_borland 3y ago